Press

WASHINGTON – The Leadership Conference Education Fund announced James Rucker as its new board chair effective September 23. Rucker is a co-founder and board member of Color Of Change, who also serves on the boards of the Southern Poverty Law Center Action Fund and MoveOn.org. He will replace Carolyn Osolinik who has served as The Education Fund’s board chair since 2019.

WASHINGTON – The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, The Leadership Conference Education Fund and more than 24 civil rights, employment, and privacy organizations today introduced principles to guide the development, use, auditing, and oversight of hiring assessment technologies. The groups urge policymakers, vendors, and employers to protect the civil rights of working people by ensuring new assessment tools that rely on algorithms and artificial intelligence do not further entrench decades of discrimination. Without guardrails in place, new assessments threaten to perpetuate unjust hiring practices based on race, ethnicity, sex, disability, age, and other factors.

WASHINGTON – The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and its sister organization, The Leadership Conference Education Fund, welcomed Janessa Sambola-Harris as a communications manager.

WASHINGTON – The Census Counts campaign today launched Stories for Change, an expanding and downloadable series of videos, quote graphics, and infographics featuring storytellers and census advocates connecting census participation to a wide spectrum of advocacy, including racial justice, immigration, disability, labor, and faith. Each featured participant speaks directly to their own communities on the opportunity the 2020 Census presents to claim the funding, resources, and political power they deserve. The series of three videos were developed in partnership with Arab American Institute, the Arab Resource Organizing Center, The Arc, and Faith in Public Life.

WASHINGTON – The Leadership Conference Education Fund has announced the hire of Kiren Marshall as national communications strategist for the voting rights program.

WASHINGTON – Noting an increase in discriminatory policing practices during COVID-19, The Leadership Conference Education Fund released principles that provide actionable recommendations for law enforcement agencies across the country to better protect the health and safety of communities and officers during the pandemic and beyond. The principles, Public Safety During COVID-19 and Beyond: Recommendations for Protecting Public Health and Our Civil Rights, received endorsements from more than 100 civil rights organizations and law enforcement groups, including The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and Law Enforcement Action Partnership (LEAP), and Carmen Best, Chief of the Seattle Police Department, Washington and Rashall Brackney, Chief of Police for Charlottesville Police Department, Virginia.

WASHINGTON – The Census Counts campaign, housed at The Leadership Conference Education Fund, led 143 other organizations in urging Congress to take action to prevent an unacceptable and unusable 2020 Census in the wake of COVID-19 by supporting significant enhancements to the methods that have been specifically designed to count historically undercounted communities. The U.S. Census Bureau needs a clear and detailed plan that includes increases in outreach so that it can execute these census operations in a way that is safe, fair, and doesn’t leave communities behind.

WASHINGTON – The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and The Leadership Conference Education Fund announced the selection of LaShawn Warren as executive vice president of government affairs for the organizations. She is currently senior vice president of campaigns and programs at the organizations and assumes her new role on May 11.

WASHINGTON – The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and The Leadership Conference Education Fund announced the addition of operations expert Monica Woods as executive vice president and chief operating officer for the organizations.

WASHINGTON – Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and The Leadership Conference Education Fund, issued the following statement in response to the U.S. Census Bureau’s request to Congress to push back the statutory deadlines for reporting census data used for apportionment and redistricting. This would allow the bureau to reactivate field offices on June 1, 2020, resume data collection shortly after, and extend field data collection and self-response to October 31, 2020.